


Fix You

by juliabaccari



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 20:26:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1085342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juliabaccari/pseuds/juliabaccari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After his first "client" in the Capitol, Finnick is broken. Johanna tries to put him back together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fix You

After his first ‘client’, Finnick refuses to see anyone for days. He stays in the Capitol even though he is not required to; he feels too broken to see Annie. She may be undone, called mad by all except those who really know her, but at least she is still pure somewhere in her heart. He is no more than a wretched creature now. He’s not worthy of her comfort, or anyone’s.

That is how he feels. 

Johanna, characteristically, ignores this.

His door slams open and she strides into the room. She does not even seem to hear his protests, and instead punches a lock code into the door that Finnick knows will keep them both inside until she puts it in again. She hides the keypad from him on the last number.

Finnick sighs.

"Get out, Jo."

"I don’t think so." She strides into the room and sits down on the sofa beside him purposefully. Her side is pressed along his, and he fights the urge to curl away from her warmth. He doesn’t deserve it, he is dirty, he is a monster.

He is infected by the Capitol.

He feels her hand cover his like she is a ghost touching him, like he’s feeling someone else’s sensations secondhand; her fingers weaving into his barely make an impression. Finnick does not own his own body anymore. What right does he have to the way her thumb brushes his skin?

Perhaps it is the Capitol who feels the heat of Johanna now. Perhaps it is the rich stranger who paid for him last Tuesday who owns the way it feels to be next to someone so alive, so bright and shining and angry that she is what fire would be were it alive.

Most everyone she touches gets burned.

Finnick wishes she could burn him now, but he feels nothing.

"Finnick." Her voice is insistent, and he turns his head to meet her eyes, but his gaze is hollow. He barely sees the sharp curve of her jaw and the hard set of her mouth. But he does see them.

"Johanna…" Finnick answers, and he feels so empty. Her hand squeezes his, hard. It’s a bit like the sensation of a limb coming awake after it has fallen asleep, prickly but pleasant in the knowing that it is there.

"Stop blaming yourself." She says, and looks down for a moment, drawing in a deep breath. "If you didn’t do it, Annie would be dead."

"I don’t blame myself." Finnick scowls. "There’s nothing left of me to blame."

"Yes there is." She insists, and he thinks - so young still, though they are not far apart in age (it doesn’t matter, he now counts his age in years since his victory, Finnick Odair the boy died in that arena anyway.)He thinks, you don’t get it. And I hope you never do.

But Johanna is nothing if not persistent. “They can’t have you, Finnick. You don’t belong to them.” She frowns when she realizes he is not listening to her, and suddenly his back hits the couch cushions.

She’s shoved him hard and, listless, he let himself collapse.

He doesn’t move.

Her face looms, twisted with anger, above him. But there are also tears pricking at the corner of Johanna’s eyes, and that does manage to surprise him.

"Jo…"

"You stupid idiot." She curses him, and thumps a hand on his chest. He stares up at the ceiling and breathes. "You idiot. Don’t let them win, not like this." 

"Then how, Jo?" Finnick asks, voice strained. He has no hope, what else is he supposed to do. "How am I supposed to live with this?"

"By distracting yourself." She answers immediately. He wonders…

"Have they asked you…?"

"Don’t."

"Jo, I thought -"

"I was old enough when I won my games, Finnick." She said, mouth twisted in disgust. "What do you expect? Why do you think he killed them?"

She means her family. Finnick never hears her speak of them, Haymitch has only said ‘She’s an orphan, that one’ and so he never asked.

Johanna must have refused, at first.

"You can’t say no." She continued. "You know you can’t. So don’t feel bad about what you have to do to keep her alive."

Finally, Finnick sits up, and he feels her arms slip around him. He welcomes the way she curls into his chest, his own personal ball of fire, and his limbs awaken enough to fold her into a hug.

"I’m sorry, Jo."

"Don’t apologize." She murmurs against his neck. "Don’t apologize, just stay alive. And keep her safe."

"I will, I promise."

"No, Finn, I mean - stay alive. In here." Her palm flattens on his chest, just over his heart. 

He pauses. His lips press hard together, and then he nods. “How?”

How do I distract myself, he’s asking. Johanna, like always, knows exactly what he means.

He watches her pick her head up, follows the indentation her teeth leave as she bites gently down on her lower lip. Finnick tracks the way her expression shifts and settles as she makes a decision.

"If you’re sure." She says, and Johanna’s hands are on his face, holding him warm and steady. It is a friendly, affectionate touch. But he knows what he’ll be accepting if he says yes.

Finnick nods.

It is an effective distraction. Johanna is warm, and soft in all the right places, sharp-edged in others. Her lips fit his own perfectly. If they weren’t best friends, Finnick thinks, they’d be wonderful lovers.

But he has Annie.

And they both love her, too.

Johanna leads him to the bed and he hands over control because it is easier, because the point is to not think, and because he trusts her. She is one of only two people in the world who truly love him after all.

Not that she’d ever say it.

She is gentler than he expected, and he suspects that she does not treat anyone else with such care. Her kisses are soft and quiet but he is relieved to find that he can feel every one like the press of a tiny burning star. 

He touches her, with light hands, concentrating on the way Johanna’s skin feels under his palms. It has traces of the smooth forced perfection of the Capitol’s polishing, but she has been in 7 recently, and there is a weather-worn feeling to it. Finnick holds tight to this.

He can’t say he ever expected to be with Johanna in this way. He has loved her for some time, even looked at her with an appreciative eye, but it has always been with a friendly tone underneath it all. Finnick did not predict sex to be an act of friendship. 

With Johanna, it is. It is how she offers to heal him, because she does not do so well with pretty words and empty gestures. She doesn’t like to pretend to be nice. But this means something to her.

Finnick undresses her almost reverently, grateful for her. She is his salvation tonight; without Johanna, he may never have found his way back to himself. And he’d certainly never have found his way back to Annie.

They take it slowly, handling one another delicately. It’s a contrast to the way the Capitol handles them, and it’s open defiance of the way they’re expected to treat one another as vicious, bloodthirsty victors. Finnick’s sort of surprised Johanna’s not scratching and clawing at him, fierce and wild. But he likes this side of her.

He thinks, fleetingly, that they might eventually get to the other parts.

He doesn’t know if he should feel guilty about that. The rules in his world are turned upside-down, and he thinks that Annie would not mind this, not at all. Because she always understands.

And because there is a place for Johanna carved into her heart as well.

So when Johanna gently parts her legs and invites Finnick inside of her, he does not hesitate, he does not regret. He lets himself be consumed by his best friend. He does his best to make her happy, too. Because he’s not the only one who needs this.

When she comes, he watches her face, drinking in the way her lips part. Afterwards he hold her close and erases her tiny frown with a kiss. They don’t speak any more. They just fall asleep.

He does not have a single nightmare, that night, for the first time in eight years.


End file.
